Everyone Knows Chicks Can't Change Tyres

I am the eldest of 5 daughters born to a mechanic and a stay at home mum. While my parents had very distinct gender roles, they both instilled in us girls the notion that we could do and be anything we wanted. My dad took us fishing on weekends, we’d hang out with him in ‘the shed’, and hand him spanners and help him sort his nuts and bolts into jars. On weekends we wore shorts and no tops and scruffed around in the dirt and led a generally genderless life. When I was 16, my dad bought me a clapped out Morris 1100. However, before I was allowed to step foot in the car, he specified 2 rules: 1. Know how to check oil and water, and how to refresh them; and 2. How to pump up and change a tyre. I’d spent so long hanging around my dad’s shed, these things were no big deal. In the days before mobile phones, changing a tyre was not only thrifty, but absolutely necessary for safety. So, when, 8 years later I came back to the carpark and found that my tyre had a 5cm nail sticking out of it, I didn’t hesitate but to get out the jack and start taking the tyre off. I was in the middle of this when 2 men drove past. They pulled in to the car park across from me and sat against the back of their car watching me. At first I didn’t realise what they were doing, so kept changing the tyre. One of them yelled out something unintelligible to me and I looked up and asked him what he’d said. “Just waiting to see if a chick can actually change a tyre. We’ve got money on it.” I was stunned, because it never even occurred to me that a woman changing a tyre would be anything but practical and necessary. They stayed there the entire time, commentating my every move. When I was done, one of them said to the other, “I guess I owe you a lazy lobster, mate!” and they walked off. I was still reeling from their blatant disrespect when they crossed the road in front of me. The loser of the bet gave me the thumbs, to which I returned my own one digit hand gesture.

1
Comment

Shelle Michels

Lol sounds like my upbringing with mystep- Dad in the 70s and early 80s .Ii was the eldest a daughter but his 'right hand man' . We fished, fixed cars , did handy work and the like. But he also cooked dinner and ironed his own shirts and pants for work as my mother also worked. They were both printers. I can't believe men still expect women to stick to defined gender roles /tasks .. I always changed my own tyres in my younger days getting a bit lazy in my early 50s though ! Probably call the NRMA now..